Analysis of Phase Error Effects on Stripmap SAS

It is often of interest to consider how uncompensated platform motion can degrade the ideal point scatterer response (PSR) of a synthetic aperture sonar (SAS). This information can be used to shape the design of the sonar itself as well as that of the platform carrying it. Also, knowledge of how certain types of motion affect a SAS image can reduce the time spent in troubleshooting motion estimation and compensation schemes. In the field of spotlight-mode synthetic aperture radar (SAR), the effects of phase errors across the synthetic aperture are well documented (for example, Chapter 5 of Carrara , 1995). The counterpart problem for the stripmap mode is less well developed in the literature. This paper explores the effects of uncompensated phase errors on stripmap imagery and shows that, under certain conditions, they are similar to those for spotlight mode processing.      

Theoretical accuracy of synthetic aperture sonar micronavigation using a displaced phase-center antenna

The Cramer-Rao lower bounds on the cross-track translation and rotation of a displaced phase-center antenna (DPCA) in the slant range plane between two successive pings (known as DPCA sway and yaw in what follows) are computed, assuming statistically homogeneous backscatter. These bounds are validated using experimental data from a 118-182-kHz sonar, showing an accuracy of the order of 20 microns on the ping-to-ping cross-track displacements. Next, the accuracy required on the DPCA sway and yaw in order to achieve a given synthetic aperture sonar (SAS) beampattern specification, specified by the expected SAS array gain, is computed as a function of the number P of pings in the SAS. Higher accuracy is required when P increases to counter the accumulation of errors during the integration of the elementary ping-to-ping estimates: the standard deviation must decrease as P/sup -1/2/ for the DPCA sway and P/sup -3/2/ for the yaw. Finally, by combining the above results, the lower bounds on DPCA micronavigation accuracy are established. These bounds set an upper limit to the SAS length achievable in practice. The maximum gain Q in cross-range resolution achievable by a DPCA micronavigated SAS is computed as a function of the key SAS parameters. These theoretical predictions are compared with simulations and experimental results.     

Mean–Standard Deviation Representation of Sonar Images for Echo Detection: Application to SAS Images

This paper addresses the detection of underwater mines echoes with application to synthetic aperture sonar (SAS) imaging. A detection method based on local first- and second-order statistical properties of the sonar images is proposed. It consists of mapping the data onto the mean-standard deviation plane highlighting these properties. With this representation, an adaptive thresholding of the data enables the separation of the echoes from the reverberation background. The procedure is automated using an entropy criterion (setting of a threshold). Applied on various SAS data sets containing both proud and buried mines, the proposed method positively compares to the conventional amplitude threshold detection method. The performances are evaluated by means of receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves.     

Motion-Compensation Improvement for Widebeam, Multiple-Receiver SAS Systems

The effect that uncompensated motion errors have on synthetic aperture sonar (SAS) imagery can be severe. Time-domain beamforming SAS reconstruction is able to compensate arbitrary track errors, but the more efficient frequency-domain reconstruction algorithms, such as the range-Doppler, chirp-scaling, and wave number (aka range migration or Stolt-mapping) algorithms do not allow for simple compensation, especially for widebeam sonars. Data processed via these block algorithms is usually compensated before azimuth compression in a computationally inexpensive preprocessing step. Unfortunately, this compensation assumes a narrowbeam geometry, causing blurring in high-resolution images collected with widebeam sonars. In this paper, we demonstrate a new technique for compensation of large, but known, motion errors in data collected with widebeam geometry sonars. The technique relies on obtaining angle-of-arrival information from the multiple-receiver array configuration typical in high-resolution SAS systems. The new method of compensating for motion errors was found to significantly outperform the previous techniques in a simulation of point-reflector imagery.      

Bistatic synthetic aperture imaging of proud and buried targets from an AUV

The use of autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) for the detection of buried mines is an area of current interest to the Mine CounterMeasures (MCM) community. AUVs offer the advantages of lower cost, stealth, reduced operator risk, and potentially improved coverage rates over more traditional mine hunters. However, AUVs also come with their own set of difficulties, including significant error in navigation and low communication rates with the mother platform and each other. In the case of bistatic detection scenarios, AUVs will therefore have difficulty knowing where exactly in space they are and the trigger time of sources on other platforms, be they ships or other AUVs. However, the potential improvement in detection and coverage rates offered by bistatic sonar concepts makes resolution of these issues a high priority. In this paper, the problems of inaccurate navigation and source timing information are addressed for the Generic Oceanographic Array Technology data set. In this experiment, conducted off Marciana Marina during June 1998, a MIT AUV with a SACLANTCEN acoustic array and acquisition system was used together with a TOPAS parametric sonar to explore issues of buried target detection using AUVs. In this paper, solutions to the navigation and timing problems are proposed which enable the effective use of bistatic synthetic aperture sonar (SAS) concepts for the detection of buried objects in the mid-frequency regime of 2-20 kHz.     

Shadow Enhancement in Synthetic Aperture Sonar Using Fixed Focusing

A shadow cast by an object on the seafloor is important information for target recognition in synthetic aperture sonar (SAS) images. Synthetic aperture imaging causes a fundamental limitation to shadow clarity because the illuminator is moved during the data collection. This leads to a blend of echo and shadow, or geometrical fill-in in the shadow region. The fill-in is most dominant for widebeam synthetic aperture imaging systems. By treating the shadow as a moving target and compensating for the motion during the synthetic aperture imagery, we avoid the geometrical shadow fill-in. We show this to be equivalent to fixing the focus at the range of the shadow caster. This novel technique, referred to as fixed focus shadow enhancement (FFSE) can be used directly as an imaging method on hydrophone data or as a postprocessing technique on the complex SAS image. We demonstrate the FFSE technique on simulated data and on real data from a rail-based SAS, and on two different SAS systems operated on a HUGIN autonomous underwater vehicle.      

Azimuthal ambiguities in synthetic aperture sonar and syntheticaperture radar imagery

It is shown that azimuthal ambiguities are not eliminated by the nulls of a sonar (or radar) beam pattern and have a definite influence on image quality. In synthetic aperture systems that are strongly limited in spatial sampling, particularly in ocean borne synthetic aperture sonar (SAS) and spaceborne synthetic aperture radar (SAR), azimuthal ambiguities will corrupt the images unless special measures are taken. These azimuthal aliases may be reduced by emphasizing the centermost portion of the available synthetic aperture length, and deemphasizing the endmost portions. This minimizes the effects from synthetic array elements that most strongly contribute to aliases     

The Impact of Multipath on High-Resolution SAS Image Statistics

As with traditional sonar, synthetic aperture sonar (SAS) is susceptible to multipath contamination, reducing the quality and also modifying the statistics of the image. Such multipath contaminants may either be environmentally induced, as is often the case when attempting to image ranges greater than the water depth resulting in returns from the boundaries, or may be induced by the system's supporting structure itself. A clear understanding of such statistical impact is necessary to advance synthetic aperture formation algorithms and for predicting system performance. Broadband acoustic data suitable for SAS processing collected with a rail-mounted mobile-tower as part of the U.S. Office of Naval Research (ONR)-funded Sediment Acoustics eXperiment 2004 (SAX04) are analyzed in this paper. Analysis focused on both system structure and environmentally induced multipath using the $K$ -distribution shape parameter as a metric. High-resolution sonar imagery often exhibited significantly non-Rayleigh, heavy-tailed envelope statistics, characterized by a low equivalent $K$-distribution shape parameter. Analysis showed a clear and significant increase in the estimated shape parameter in the presence of multipath, representing a trend toward a Rayleigh-distributed envelope. A model for reverberation is presented to provide bounds of the statistical impact using observable image intensity level increases in synthetic-aperture-formed images caused by multipath contamination. This model further shows potential for statistical impact when multipath arrivals are of similar level as the direct path even when not observable in the image (e.g., within 10 dB).      

A synthetic aperture sonar system capable of operating at high speed and in turbulent media

Despite their potential ability to produce highly resolved images of the seabed, synthetic aperture sonars are not widely used. The primary reason for this restricted use is that most synthetic aperture systems are based on the radiation and detection of short-duration modulated pulses. Due to the low speed of sound in water, the pulse repetition frequency is low and so it has been difficult to maintain the required pulse-to-pulse phase coherence. This paper describes a new approach to synthetic aperture sonars based on continuous transmission with some form of frequency modulation. That is, a sonar that transmits and receives continuously but uses some form of frequency coding (in this case a linear frequency sweep) to determine range. Using a continuous transmission frequency modulated sonar it is possible to make a synthetic aperture sonar that can produce coherent apertures many wavelengths long. In addition to the combination of synthetic apertures and continuous transmission frequency modulation, further modifications are suggested to reduce the effect of lateral towfish movement and the effects of medium turbulence resulting in random path-length variations.     

Relative Height Estimation by Cross-Correlating Ground-Range Synthetic Aperture Sonar Images

The relative height of the seafloor can be estimated by using two vertically displaced receivers. In this paper, we propose techniques to improve the accuracy of the estimated height. Our results are based on the use of synthetic aperture sonar (SAS) imaging, which implies coherent addition of complex images acquired from a moving platform. The SAS processing improves the along-track (or azimuth) resolution, as well as the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), which in turn improves the estimated height accuracy. We show that the shift of the effective center frequency induced by coherent, frequency-dependent scattering affect the time-delay estimates from complex cross correlations, and we propose a correction technique for broadband signals with uneven magnitude spectra. To reduce the effect of geometrical decorrelation and increase the coherence between the images, we beamform the sonar images onto an a priori estimate of the seafloor height before correlating. We develop a mathematical model for the imaging geometry. Finally, we demonstrate our proposed estimators by providing relative seafloor height estimates from real aperture and SAS images, obtained during the InSAS-2000 experiment at Elba Island in Italy. In particular, we demonstrate that the SAS image quality is significantly improved by inclusion of the height estimates as a priori information.     

Synthetic Aperture Sonar: A Review of Current Status

This is a review paper that surveys past work in, and the recent status of, active synthetic aperture sonar (SAS). It covers the early historical development of SAS with its provenance in synthetic aperture radar (SAR) and flows through into what work has been published in the open literature up to early 2007. The list of references is sufficiently complete to include most past and recent SAS publications in the open refereed literature.      

Alternate schemes in synthetic aperture sonar processing

Suboptimal processing schemes, the application of which is not widespread in synthetic aperture sonar processing, are described with reference to seafloor imaging. It is shown that their application can result in a significant increase of the azimuth resolution of the sonar system with respect to the resolution due to its physical beamwidth, without imposing unreasonable constraints on the sonar platform trajectory.     

Seafloor profiling by a wideband sonar: simulation,frequency-response optimization, and results of a brief sea test

An ahead-looking probe of some kind, optical or acoustic, is critical when one is attempting seafloor exploration from a mobile platform. A single-frequency, split aperture sonar system can be used for this purpose, but a wideband monopulse sonar offers many advantages. It computes a running estimate of the vertical directional cosine of the source of the echo, and can thus reveal the positions of multiple wave scatterers as long as their echoes can still be time resolved. Theoretical studies of its performance have been made previously, but were directly applicable only to extremely simple seafloor geometries. A new time-domain digital simulation that largely circumvents this limitation has been developed. The simulation also provides a means for testing the theory and optimizing system parameters. The reverberation model does not account for some features of acoustic backscattering such as diffraction, but it is believed to be adequate for the investigation of most signal processing aspects of the sonar system. The theory of the simulation is developed and several examples are presented and discussed. In addition, some preliminary results are presented from a sea test that used the air-sea interface as a surrogate seafloor     

基于非线性滤波的水下地形辅助导航方法

为了解决水下航行器惯性导航误差随时间积累问题,利用地形辅助导航技术进行导航位置修正。由于水下地形的非线性,对基于扩展卡尔曼滤波(EKF)、无迹卡尔曼滤波(UKF)和粒子滤波(PF)3种非线性滤波方法的水下地形辅助导航算法进行研究。针对传统基于单波束声纳量测模型在小起伏地形区域导航精度低、易发散问题,从提高量测地形信息量角度,建立了基于多波束测深声纳的量测模型。使用多波束实测地形数据进行仿真试验,结果表明:无论在粗糙地形区域还是较平坦地形区域,多波束量测模型有效缓解了3种方法易发散问题,提高了导航精度。     

Real- and synthetic-array signal processing of buried targets

Results from two field experiments aimed at investigating the detection and classification of buried targets are presented. In both experiments a 2-16-kHz parametric source was used. In the first experiment, the source was used in combination with a 12-m horizontal line array and in the second with a 1.4-m vertical line array which was displaced horizontally along an underwater rail to form a 10 m /spl times/ 1.4 m two-dimensional synthetic aperture sonar (SAS). To increase the SAS integration time, the parametric source was electronically scanned in azimuth during the displacement along the rail, as in spotlight mode. It is shown that both arrays allow important signal-to-reverberation gains, enhancing the detection of sub-bottom echoes. A new, environmentally adaptive, matched filter which further improves the signal to reverberation ratio while allowing discrimination between proud and buried targets is presented and validated experimentally. The use of resonant scattering for target classification of buried objects is discussed, in the particular case of spherical shells.     

SHADOWS合成孔径声纳系统及性能测试

与传统的侧扫声纳相比,合成孔径声纳系统具有全覆盖无遗漏扫测,测量范围大、速度快,图像分辨率高等优点。本文介绍我国引进第一套SHADOWS合成孔径声纳系统的技术性能,分析SHADOWS合成孔径声纳系统性能测试情况及实际测量中的应用价值,提出了存在的问题及其对策。     

海洋石油管线探测多波束剖面声纳设计

针对海洋石油管线探测多波束剖面声纳的高速、大容量的实时信号处理任务,以及声纳系统进一步扩展的需求,设计并实现了一种基于IP网络互连的、以并行DSP为处理节点的多波束剖面声纳系统.该系统应用于海底石油管线探测与定位,系统中的每个处理节点与数据采集转换部分采用TCP/IP网络连接,可以通过物理上添加一个或多个处理节点成倍的提高系统的信号处理能力,而在软件上无须大的改动.通过电联调与水槽试验,验证了系统的可行性和稳定性,该设计为高速水声阵列信号实时处理系统提供了一种全新的解决思路.     

A deconvolution algorithm for broadband synthetic aperture dataprocessing

Conventional processing of synthetic aperture sonar (SAS) data is equivalent to a two-dimensional matched filter operation. In principle, two-dimensional deconvolution improves the resolution of the processed image. However, its direct implementation is generally impractical, due to numerical problems. The paper discusses the development of iterative algorithms that efficiently perform the deconvolution of broadband synthetic aperture data and gives examples of their application. It is concluded that, in many cases, the proposed approach is preferable to more classical solutions     

三维合成孔径声呐在海底掩埋目标探查中的应用现状与展望

为提高我国海底掩埋目标的探查技术,以适应不断发展的探测需求,文章综述了现有三维合成孔径声呐在海底掩埋目标探查中的应用现状,并对关键技术的发展方向进行了展望。结果表明:尽管三维合成孔径声呐在海底掩埋目标探查中具有较大的技术优势,但是由于技术难度大、复杂程度高,可提供成熟商用设备的单位仅有两家,中科探海研发的三维合成孔径声呐系统多项核心技术指标领先。运动误差估计和补偿技术,掩埋目标特征提取和识别分类算法,多通道大规模数据并行处理算法等关键技术将成为三维合成孔径声呐系统未来的发展方向。